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Friday, May 06, 2011

European media elites are sniffing their hardest over the barbaric Americans celebrating the death of Osama bin Laden.

Nicolas Demorand, editor of the left-leaning French daily Libération, on Tuesday bemoaned the “toxic rhetoric” of the campaign against terrorism. From that rhetoric, he wrote, stems “this base, uncomfortable joy, unprecedented in a democracy, that blew yesterday over the streets of New York.”

Even the editor of the centrist weekly L’Express, Christophe Barbier, cautioned, “To victory one must not add provocation.” He added: “To desecrate the cadaver or the memory of Bin Laden is to revive him. To cry one’s joy in the streets of our cities is to ape the turbaned barbarians who danced the night of Sept. 11.

As Jonathan Tobin writes, the European reaction of the elites says more about them than about us. But it also shows they have a rather short memory. Or a very selective one.

For a French newspaper editor to seriously state that such behavior is unprecedented in a democracy shows a shocking ignorance of his own country's history. French democracy is built on much worse. La Marseillaise makes the US national anthem seem downright pacifist with its naked bloodlust.

In more recent history, there is the treatment of collaborators in Europe after WW2. And the death of Mussolini as depicted in the photo.

On 29 April 1945, the bodies of Mussolini, Petacci, and the other executed Fascists were loaded into a moving van and trucked south to Milan. There, at 3:00 am, they were dumped on the ground in the old Piazza Loreto. After being shot, kicked, and spat upon, the bodies were hung upside down on meathooks from the roof of an Esso gas station. The bodies were then stoned by civilians from below. The corpse of the deposed leader became subject to ridicule and abuse.

That is a somewhat polite summation of events. European elites might talk about values, but such talk is hollow. Nor would they seriously condemn what was described above. Many European leftists view it as a glorious moment. Their sneering at the American celebrations is a fact of emotional detachment. Nothing else. If it were Bush, they would be popping champagne faster than you could say Unilateralism.

But it's an embedded narrative that Americans are the rough country cousins and European intellectuals are the progressive vanguard of civilization. A narrative that goes back to colonial times.

Had the execution of Bin Laden happened on Bush's watch, there would be a vocal display of nauseated anger, condemnations of American barbarity and a few amateur art exhibits or two featuring Bush biting off the head of Bin Laden or some such thing. But it's Obama, and they don't quite know what to do with him. They aren't about to peg him into the cartoon monster that Bush was turned into. They recognize that Obama is pandering ahead of an election to what they see as the baser instincts. And they feel that what happened reflects more on Americans, than on Obama.

But Obama has pandered far more to the sensibilities of Muslims. Getting Bin Laden was an act of political necessity, but pandering to his co-religionists is another matter. From the burial to the refusal to release the photos, the concern over what Muslims will think has dominated much of the decision making.

A man who gave his name as Mohammed demanded to see photographic evidence. Asked how he might react to graphic photos of a dead bin Laden, shot in the head in the 40-minute raid, he said: "Well, I'll know when I see them."

"Americans are creating problems all over the world," he added. "Why can't they just leave Muslims alone?"

Indeed, why couldn't Americans leave poor Bin Laden alone. It's not like he was harming anyone who mattered. Like Mohammed.

Current events in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Europe and North America though raise the question of why Muslims keep creating problems all over the world. Why can't they just leave non-Muslims alone?

In London, about 100 members of the radical Islamist group, Muslims Against Crusades (MAC), staged a protest and "funeral prayers" in honor of Osama bin Laden outside the U.S. Embassy.

The group shouted slogans such as "Freedom burn in hell" and "USA will pay" while waving banners stating "Jihad against crusaders" and "Sharia law for UK."

Anjem Choudary, one of the leading MAC figures, said they were protesting against "injustices" committed by the United States: "The latest injustice is the assassination of an old man in his home in front of his family, Sheikh Osama bin Laden."

He warned of future revenge attacks by militants.

"I believe al Qaeda will take revenge. The next operation I believe will be called 'Operation bin Laden' and will match the magnitude and character of the past.

"The philosophy of al Qaeda is to take the war to the enemy on their own homeland, so it will be in the West."

The MAC protesters were confronted by about 50 members of the right-wing, anti-Islamist organization the English Defense League (EDL), with police having to keep the two chanting groups apart, amid minor scuffles.

Incidentally members of the EDL are in jail, but Choudary is a free man. It's not like he's a bigot inciting violence... not like those mean EDL people. Why can't they and the Navy SEALS just leave Muslims like Bin Laden and Choudary alone?

The bin Laden supporters waved banners reading "US govt are the real terrorists" and US leaders were branded "murderers" by the radicals, who warned revenge attacks were "guaranteed".

"It is only a matter of time before another atrocity -- the West is the enemy," Abu Muaz, 28, from east London, said.

Luckily law enforcement jumped into action and...

Officers confiscated an effigy of bin Laden being waved by the EDL supporters but police said they had no immediate reports of any arrests at the ongoing demonstration.

Well there problem solved.

A judge in Hamburg filed a criminal complaint against Chancellor Angela Merkel Friday for "endorsing a criminal act" because at a news conference in Berlin Tuesday she has said: "I'm glad that killing bin Laden was successful."

The labor court judge, Heinz Uthmann, told Reuters that he believed Merkel's comments violate German law. He said, however, he expected his complaint to end up in the rubbish bin.

U.N. human rights investigators called on the United States on Friday to disclose whether there had been any plan to capture Osama bin Laden and if he was offered any "meaningful prospect of surrender and arrest."

“They martyred Osama, who was able to stand up to the world’s harshest power,” Sheikh Hafez Salama Salama said at a stop along the way, where a small, eclectic crowd had gathered as usual in Tahrir Square, reliving the revolution. “We are all Osama bin Laden.”

Clearly someone never bothered to inform Sheikh Hafez Salama that he is a member of the Religion of Peace. But there were also more mainstream views being expressed.

We are very against violence,” said Ibrahim Haggag, 45, speaking of Muslims generally. “They could be framing him as an excuse to attack Arabs, an excuse to take their wealth.”

“The Jews were the ones who planned 9/11,” said Amina Mohame, 28. “If the U.S. is a civil society, why did they fund Bush’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan?”

The demonstrators rallied at the Fatih mosque in central Istanbul at the call of Islamist newspaper Milli Gazete and with support of the Islamist organization Ozgur-Der.

The mainly male protestors, with a small group of veiled women, brandished banners reading "Terrorist USA, warrior Osama" and chanted "God is great."

Ozgur-der was one of the groups involved in the very peaceful Gaza flotilla and its members were on board the peaceful ship Mavi Marmara which at no point in time ever tried to kill anyone or support terrorists. Absolutely not.

Scores of Indonesian men rallied on Friday to publicly vow their readiness to sacrifice their lives to avenge the death of Osama bin Laden, in a sign of the al Qaeda leader's popularity among hard-core Islamists in the most populous Muslim country.

"One hundred youths from Solo are ready to die to take revenge on the death of Osama," declared Choirul, a cleric in Al Kaida Solo and also a member of the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) which has a history of violence including attacks on bars, nightclubs and the offices of Indonesia's Playboy magazine.

In addition the clerics are very upset about disrespecting the body of Sheikh Usama PBUH (Pigs Be Upon Him)

The Indonesia Ulema Council (MUI), which is the top Islamic body in Indonesia, has strongly criticized the sea burial of bin Laden, saying that “it was done with extraordinary hatred against him” and the body should have been buried in the earth.

“A Muslim, whatever his profession, even a criminal, their rites must be respected. There must be a prayer and the body should be wrapped in white cloth before being buried in the earth, not at sea,” MUI chief H. Amidhan told AFP.

Officers used anti-riot shields to push back the marchers from Manila's main mosque before they reached the boulevard leading to the seaside embassy compound after Friday's noon prayers. The protesters later dispersed peacefully.

Protest leader and Islamic cleric Alim Jamil Yahya says he condemns the "brutal killing" of bin Laden and describes the al-Qaida founder's burial at sea as a desecration of his body.

He says that although many Muslims did not agree with bin Laden's methods, they still revered him as a martyr because he fought for freedom against oppression by "the satanic U.S. hegemony."

The group also expressed support for Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi and called for an end to the NATO bombings.

They carried a banner saying "Stop genocide in Libya! Let Muslims rule their own land. US allies: Stay out of Muslim lands."

"Osama's services for Muslims will be remembered forever," said Abdul Qadir Looni, a senior JUI figure addressing the rally.

"He challenged the greatest Satan and usurper like America and awakened Muslims across the globe. This gathering pays tribute to him," Looni said.

Hafiz Fazal Bareach, a former federal senator and senior party leader, said the US killing of bin Laden would create thousands of others like him.

"One Osama has been martyred and now thousands of Osamas will be born, because he created a movement against anti-Muslim forces which is not dependent on personalities," Bareach said.

"America first martyred Osama and then desecrated his corpse," he said, vowing that "jihad (holy war) will continue against America and its allies."

Pakistan's largest religious political party Jamaat-e-Islami called for protests across the country on Friday to denounce the US operation that killed bin Laden in the garrison city of Abbottabad earlier this week.

They're shouting in Istanbul. They're shouting in Cairo, in London, in Manilla, Indonesia, Pakistan and Lebanon. If they start shouting in Atlanta, then we'll know we hit the motherlode.

A radical German Muslim was set to hold a controversial open air rally in Frankfurt Saturday after a court overturned a ban, but a judge warned him and his supporters not to even utter the words 'Osama bin Laden.'

City officials had earlier tried to stop the event in Frankfurt after Pierre Vogel, a former boxer who has converted to Islam, said he would recite a prayer for bin Laden.

Vogel, a preacher, says on his website he does not sympathize with bin Laden. However, authorities, who regard him as a menace, suspect his sermon, entitled 'Islam's Attitude to Terrorism,' will be subtly supportive of extremism.

I refuse to believe that a Muslim event could be subtly supportive of extremism.

Cindy Sheehan, the Northern California peace activist who rose to prominence for starting an encampment near President Bush‘s Texas ranch, will headline a week-long occupation of the State Capitol next week to protest proposed spending cuts and encourage lawmakers to extend tax hikes.

How low of Sheenan, didn't she used to be against occupation? It's sad when a dedicated anti-occupation fighter endorses occupation.

Last month, news broke that the California Teachers Association, arguably the most powerful player in California state politics, was organizing a Wisconsin-style takeover of the State Capitol in Sacramento to push state legislators to approve an extension of tax increases that are set to expire at the end of June. Unlike Gov. Brown, who promised during the campaign that there would be no tax increases without voter approval, the CTA wants the Legislature and the governor to approve the tax extensions without voter input.

Boldly, the CTA has published online its “Plan of Action” for next week, which includes a five-day sit-in at the State Capitol as well as a “Refrain from Shopping” day to show the economic power of educators. The association says it will have at least 300 volunteers participating in the Capitol sit-in.

It seems like in that case the people of California will have the right to rise up against their education oppressors. Hopefully Cindy Sheehan will endorse such a popular people's movement of resistance against the occupation of their state capitol.

At one point, Sheehan said California needs a progressive income tax system, where the rich are taxed at a higher rate than the poor. California already has an incredibly progressive income tax system.

“I’m willing to be arrested if that’s what its going to take,” said Sheehan, who added that the occupation will last “as long as we can sustain it. Hopefully, it will call enough attention to the problem we’re having here. The problems of California can’t be isolated from the problems of the federal government.”

The press conference ended with a reporter asking Sheehan for her reaction to the death of Osama bin Laden. She said: “I think that there are as many unanswered questions about that as there is about 9-11.”

Poor Cindy. Doesn't she know that no occupation can be sustained indefinitely?

But of course no news cycle would be complete without the dread plague of our time being mentioned. Islamophobia. It's in your neighborhoods, your pants and maybe even your drinking water. Scientists it has killed twice as many people as saran wrap and peking duck combined.

The aftermath of Osama Bin Laden’s death has undoubtedly amplified ignorant thoughts and feelings of paranoia against Muslims in this country. Earlier this week, a ninth grade algebra teacher disrespected an American-born Muslim student when he asked her if she was grieving because her “uncle” had died, referring to Osama Bin Laden.

The teacher, whom school officials did not identify, allegedly made the remark to his student during class at Clear Brook High School in Friendswood, a city located 23 miles southeast of Houston, TX. School officials were notified about the teacher’s unprofessionalism when another student repeated the remark to her mother, according The Washington Post.

“The student did the right thing and immediately notified an adult regarding the teacher’s comments. The principal at Clear Brook High School notified the child’s parents and has been in communication with the family,” said Clear Creek school district spokeswoman Elaina Polsen. The teacher has been placed on leave pending an investigation into his comment.

I hope we can get as many investigators as possible on this case. It's just shocking how much time is wasted on rapes, murders and that minor incident where 3,000 people were killed by some random crazies... when serious cases like this cry out for serious and obsessive investigation.

And the answer is, yes she was grieving, but after having some ice cream she feels much better now.

According to Moore "We've lost something of our soul here in this country" by "executing" Osama bin Laden

In his trademark fashion, Moore also asked piercing questions such as

"How come no headline ever read "Multi-Millionaire Murders 3,000"? It would have been correct. No, best to focus on OBL being a "Muslim,'"

Oddly it's because Bin Laden's killing spree took place in the name of Islam, rather than capitalism. Just as when discussing Moore's movies, we don't say, "Multimillionaire creates fake propaganda film masquerading as documentary."

I am a Catholic, and the position of the Catholic Church and the Pope is that we are 100 percent against the death penalty unless it is in self-defense. Look at the Nuremberg Trials. We didn’t just pop a bullet in the heads of the worst scum in history. We thought it was important to put them on trial and expose their evil. In a democracy we believe in a system of justice and we believe in a judicial system that gives people a day in court...and then we hung them.

It doesn’t mean we can’t hang them afterward.

Michael Moore, abortion loving Catholic. Who is absolutely against executing terrorists without a trial because he's opposed to the death penalty. I could try to follow the logic here, but I'd probably end up a hangover.

There's more of a case to make that America has lost its soul when someone like this has bestselling books and movies. Also when things like this keep happening...

But as we all know there is no compulsion in Islam. If you convert to Islam, but your family refuses, then you don't compel them. You just butcher them. And in a Come to Allah moment, that's just what one Chicago man did.

A man who was angry that his family would not go along with his conversion to Islam was sentenced to life in prison Wednesday in the slayings of his mother, pregnant wife, infant son and two nieces in a rampage last year on the South Side.

...

“He was upset at his wife and their family — he felt disrespected that they would not join his religion,” Assistant State’s Attorney Jim McKay said. “It didn’t matter if they were young or old, pregnant or not. He wanted them dead.”

...

The massacre began in the early morning hours April 14, at the family home in the 7400 block of South Mozart Street. Larry first shot his mother, Leona Larry, 57, as she slept on a sofa in the living room. He then went systematically through three first-floor bedrooms, fatally shooting his wife, Twanda Thompson, 19; his 7-month-old son, Jihad; his 3-year-old niece, Keleasha Larry; and his 16-year-old niece, Keyshai Fields, who was pregnant.

Larry also shot his 13-year-old nephew, Demond Larry, in the face, but the boy survived. The defendant then kicked in the bedroom door of a man who lived in the basement of the home and tried to shoot him, but no bullets fired, prosecutors said.

...

When Larry was arrested a short time later, he said to police that Allah told him to kill his family, according to court records. A police report quoted him as saying: “I wish I had more bullets. I wish I had more bullets.”

This is what happens when Allah tells you to kill your family, but doesn't provide you with enough ammo.

I think Larry was experiencing the same mixed emotions as Osama bin Laden, on realizing that maybe following the dictates of a 7th century madman is not such a good plan after all, once people with bigger guns and more ammo show up on the scene.

But I know that most Muslims would strongly differ with what he did. It doesn't seem like he offered the man whose door he kicked down a chance to convert to Islam before trying to kill him. And that is just not Halal.

In the more general roundup of the week, remember that Kennedys miniseries which was in no way suppressed by a paranoid and controlling family using its deep media connections.
Well it kinda was

THERE IS A CERTAIN MACHIAVELLIAN side to the Kennedy family, an aspect completely at odds with the public image, and it has manifested itself again and again since JFK’s assassination on November 22, 1963. The Kennedys and their allies have been trying to shape and control how the president and the family will be remembered ever since.

Whether it’s behind-the-scenes threats, purging of embarrassing records from the archives, or decisions about who gets library access and who doesn’t — what’s become clear to me over the decades is that the family will lay siege to a project of which it disapproves, marshaling a campaign of public denigration and private pressure, none of which can be easily traced back to the source. For the Kennedys, the point of historiography is not to search for truths but to buttress the family’s political and cultural legacy — or, to put it more simply, to keep people from writing things about them that they don’t like.

....

Some of the stern conversations, Crichton told me, were with Esther Newberg and Gary Ginsberg, two confidants of Caroline Kennedy. The two exemplify the kind of standard-bearer on which this generation of Kennedys relies. Newberg, an executive vice president at International Creative Management, is Caroline’s literary agent. She earned her entrée to the family as one of the famous “Boiler Room Girls” with whom Ted Kennedy was partying before he drove off the bridge at Chappaquiddick. Newberg has never publicly spoken of that tragic night, earning the family’s trust and gratitude.

Gary Ginsberg, a lawyer, was a friend of John Jr.’s at Brown University who worked as an editor at George and also served as the magazine’s legal counsel. Ginsberg would eventually hitch his wagon to Rupert Murdoch, whom he served as a kind of back-channel dealmaker. In fact, John had recommended him for that job.

Ginsberg would reportedly later persuade Murdoch to spike a story in his New York Post about the rowdiness of Caroline’s teenage daughter Rose; Caroline eventually wrote a letter of recommendation to Brearley, a fancy girls’ school in Manhattan, on behalf of Murdoch’s daughter Grace. In 2008, when Caroline made her embarrassing sort-of Senate run, Murdoch’s Post, not known as a friend of Democrats, endorsed her. Caroline, in return, helped arrange a phone call between Murdoch and then–presidential candidate Barack Obama. Ginsberg eventually received a place on the board of the JFK library.

This is how it works with the Kennedys: Powerful people do things for them, and in return, they become known as friends of the Kennedys. The networking possibilities are epic, the social prestige even greater. It’s like being conferred an honorary doctorate by American history.

With the surrogates of Jack, Bobby, and Ted, the motivation to join the club was generally ideological, a loyalty based on common values and goals. Now that there are no Kennedys holding major public office, it’s more pragmatic — money, power, society, and, sometimes, self-esteem. Being friends with a Kennedy makes some people feel important. “When you’re dealing with personalities like the Kennedys, you’re dealing with a cult,” one Kennedy biographer told me. “Not even a group of friends. Admiration is too soft a word. It’s a cult.”

That just means the followers of the Cult of Kennedy are badly in need of a deprogrammer.

Supporters of more mainstream candidates are badly put out by Pawlenty's implosion and Cain's strong showing in the debate. Of course all the talk is of how to convince the proles that Pawlenty is their man. But they've got the question wrong. It's not how to convince Republican primary voters to support Pawlenty, it's how to convince the rest of the country to support him against Obama in a general election. And good luck with that.

Being a rebellious Tea Party type, I'm getting really sick of The Ruling Class telling me what's what. First it was Trump, and now Cain. One more, and there will be a verifiable pattern in which whoever piques the interest of The People is automatically disqualified by our "superior thinkers" (emphasis on superior).

Now I don't mind the difference of opinion. What I mind is the punditry's apparent utter lack of curiosity about the voters, the heartland, the actual people who make this country work -- the ones who drive trucks, fix fences, nurse the sick, grow and sell vegetables, deliver the mail, dig coal, put out fires, devote themselves to improving their county's water pipes and sidewalks, go to church on Sundays, feel obliged and proud to serve in the military, know their U.S. history (and expect you to know it as well) and in all good humor, live and preserve the values that once distinguished America. I mind that a unanimous focus group can be so easily and summarily dismissed.

The forum was limited. Pawlenty is slightly more exciting than wallpaper. Ron Paul is his predictably whiny nutty self with a cultish fanbase that can't wait to hear how the CIA engineered 9/11. Gary Johnson will alienate most Republicans on policy positions alone. Rick Santorum is the closest thing to competition Cain had.

The big brains are worrying over how to sell Pawlenty. Here's a thought. If Pawlenty can't beat Herman Cain, then how is he going to beat anyone? Maybe instead of trying to figure out how to sell a bad candidate, maybe it's time to figure out how to find a good one.

Rick Santorum made some valid points and he was willing to stand up for his values. Which is a lot more impressive in an environment of truces on social issues because it might upset voters (but let's eliminate medicare because that won't).

Yousef's Facebook page has a partial defense against the accusations, though it appears to have been authored by one of his Danish supporters. I am not particularly concerned one way or another. This sort of thing happens all the time.

Because nothing says journalism like a propaganda network funded by a dictatorship that promotes terrorists.

But let's be fair here, if Columbia's School of Soros Journalism is going to give Al Jazeera an award, it needs to share. Why not include Russia Today or Xinhua? And what about Eun Kyoung Kwon, North Korea's courageous journalistic outlet for everything that agrees with the word of Comrade Kim Jong Il (beloved of the moon and radiator of daisies).

What really bothers me is that Columbia is playing favorites here. Why should one dictatorship's pet propaganda network get an award just because some money may have possibly changed hands. Where is Columbia University's integrity?

I leave you with more great Columbia School of Journalism worthy reportage from Libyan Jamahiriya Broadcasting Corporation, almost as courageous a source of journalistic integrity as Al-Jazeera.

The leader of the revolution and Libyan people received more cables of consolation for martyrdom of his son, Seif Al-Arab Muammar Al-Gaddafi, and three of his grandchildren, besides their friends and neighbors whom were killed after an airstrike launched by the crusader coalition of NATO, targeting the leader's house in Tripoli city.

Revolutionary president, Daniel Ortega, of Nicaragua republic denounced the terrorist act of NATO that resulted in the martyrdom of the leader's son, Seif Al-Islam Muammar Al-Gaddafi and three of his grandchildren, describing it by "a shameful crime" .

And in sports news

Libyan Basketball team in A training camp.

Today Thursday, our national team for basketball have started an open local training camp at 23rd Sep, Elfathe, Sport Hall in Tripoli.

Come on I think this deserves the Columbia School of Journalism's highest award, a Duranty.

6
comments:

Anonymous
said...

"But it's an embedded narrative that Americans are the rough country cousins and European intellectuals are the progressive vanguard of civilization" These progressive vanguard paid ransom to terror during the 80's and are being guarded by American Army [How much this costs ? ] since the 50's.They should be reminded of their reality when they preach to the US or to Israel

I haven't read or seen anything that indicates that Americans have passed candy out to children as a celebration of Bin Laden's killing.Compare this to the behaviors of Moslem religious nationalists when Israeli Jews are murdered.

Daniel, I had read the article about Michael Moore's take on the killing of Bin Laden and I think you nailed it when you said trying to keep up with his logic would give you a hangover. Let's see, he's opposed to the death penalty unless it's in self defense. I believe that killing someone is called just that - self defense. I've never heard it called the death penalty. He contradicted himself when he seemed to endorse the hanging of the Nazi war criminals. He says he's a Catholic and the Catholic church's position is 100% against the death penalty. I may be wrong, but I don't think that's the official position of the church. I do know that the church's position is 100% pro-life. That's typical of pro-choice people though. It's o.k. to kill the innocent, better not kill the guilty.

I enjoyed your humor through-out this article. I think you must've written this article with your tongue in your cheek.

Let me clarify when I said killing someone is called self-defense - I meant to say killing someone IN self defense is called self defense not the death penalty. You probably knew what I meant, but when I re-read it was worded awkwardly.

This was fantastic Daniel. Perhaps this atatement,U.N. human rights investigators called on the United States on Friday to disclose whether there had been any plan to capture Osama bin Laden and if he was offered any "meaningful prospect of surrender and arrest."

Along with all hell breaking loose in the Muslim World breaking loose if Bush had been in charge. I've been writing a great deal on this at achargingelephant, but have cross linked with you on my other site. I used your logo I love it, keep on firing my friend, Patriots don't quit. Jim Campbell